OK, so this item has absolutely nothing to do with theater, but whenever I merely mention “John Denver” in my theater blog, the hits go through the roof. So, thanks, “John Denver” fans. Go, google, go!

The ninth annual John Denver Spirit Award will be presented to Broadway producer Stewart F. Lane at an Oct. 12 ceremony in New York’s Central Park. The award, presented by the Starsong Foundation and JD Spirit, celebrates the legacy of the late singer/songwriter John Denver.

Lane is being honored for creating the new musical “A Moment In Time,” about a mortally wounded marine in Afghanistan who recalls a happier time with his family in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia and finds a reason to live. The score is made up of songs written by Denver. The musical was premiered at the Dix Hill Performing Arts Center in Huntington, N.Y., and a developmental reading is planned for later this month in hopes that it might one day be presented on Broadway.

Lane is a five-time Tony award winner and a four-time Drama Desk Award winner, most reecently for producing “War Horse.” He is also an author, playwright and co-owner/operator of the Palace Theatre in New York.Read more…

The Denver Post offers you the chance to read short samples from original plays being performed in the area. And with the four newly posted samples, our series has turned 100 – excerpts offered.

New plays are a hard sell. The audience has no familiarity with the title or content. Tickets are (relatively) expensive. It’s a risk. The kind of risk that makes going to the theater thrilling for most of us, but also it’s also a risk some people seem unwilling to take. In an era when Broadway and local producers are endlessly pushing old or familiar titles culled from existing source material, it’s harder than ever to get audiences to give something unfamiliar a try.

That’s why we started our sampler series. Read a scene for yourself. Get a sense of the writer’s style and subject matter. Maybe it will make a few readers want to give a new play a try and go see it for themselves.

That’s the hope anyway.

If you haven’t read from our sampler series before, here are the four newest entries. (Current samples are always posted at denverpost.com/theater). Each is available in the convenient PDF format, meaning you can easily adjust the type size to fit your eye comfort. Each comes with performance and contact info, in case you decide to see one of these plays for yourself.

Erma Deutschendorf, here receiving an award from Denver Center founder Donald Seawell, had a dream that John was in the bathroom shaving, telling her “I’ll be out in a little bit, Mom.’ She says, “I’m sure he’s watching over me.’ Photo by Brian Brainerd, The Denver Post

Editor’s note: Erma Deutschendorf died today. This is a reposting of a story I wrote in March 2002 in advance of the Denver Center Theatre Company’s “Almost Heaven: Songs and Stories of John Denver.”

A word without end: John Denver’s messages still comfort family

By John Moore
Denver Post Theater Critic

“I would not be the man I am, nor would I sing the way I do,
nor would I have written the songs I have written without the
influence and inspiration you have been to me. I want you to know
that today there are hundreds, if not thousands, who join me in
saying, “God bless the day that you were born.'” – From John Denver’s birthday letter to his mother, two months before his death